For every death comes birth

Kamatayan, kaliwa, kanan...saan ka pa! Leche...#Dutertepalpak. These days feel like the Angel of Death Passover, but instead of passing over, it's lingering with a deathlist of sorts.

I've been following New Amsterdam for quite a while, more to escape or a way to deal with this thing called death. Then came this one episode - was it Sharpe, Bloom or Giselle who died?...Not the baby please.

Like yuh yuh, I believe in God and afterlife, and that death is the only way to get to that new life.  Like ok, Jesus resurrection is what we Christians hold on to, but did God really "feel' what it means to have a loved one die? He isn't totally human, so does he actually have feelings. And if we are to live our lives to follow his will or become his likeness or even to glorify him, to whose gain? Doesn't that make him a selfish God.

So really, the idea of death at this time of Covid 19 either makes angry or sad. There have been numbing days, cynic days and wanting-to-deactivate-FB entirely-days. Angrier even that we simply have to settle with FB to send our condolences amidst people posting on food, fashion, outdoor travels and all sorts of memes. People just don't shut up. 

And Death is such a cheat, I'd say. It's cheated on me my 4x my side of the family; 3x my side of friends. Among my tight circle of UPOU colleagues, I'm the only left with 2 'live' parents. The deaths are a combie of Covid-19 and other sicknesses. My generation has now reached that stage of dealing with actual deaths of aging loved ones AND sudden deaths due to this pandemic. 

After that major zoom hosting for my aunt from May - June 2020, I no longer want to join zoom funerals. It's really just not my way of consoling others and myself too. While my husbandry simply turns to his rosary prayers and FB anti-Dutz postings, these months, I just numb myself through lots of work to do.  Then there are cheerie days when I just 'Like' or try to be happy for my sister's garden, somebody else' plants, some webinar,  our pets etcetera, etcetera. 

And I guess, I can only to turn to research and writing to cope. I must be still riding on the wave of finishing my PhD, and just gotta keep on swimming. Maybe once I stop research and writing, that will be the death of me. Then my physicality will deteriorate eventually, perhaps at age 60 or so. Not unless I get a stroke. So yes, I've thought about my eventual death. 

While I can still see and feel glimpses of positivity, I write. What's good about writing as an escape is that I can go on and go on with it. So may as well use it to mark these deaths cuz death AND MY WRITING are just here to stay.

Jotting down these milestones and dedicating these to real names of real people. I have no flowers to offer, nor presence so here, I lay at your feet my writings around the time of your death, perhaps as a way to hold on to dear life while you folks have transitioned well to your afterlife.

Pandemic Year 2020

> Thesis submission 1 - Tita Ely

> Faculty Grant proposal - Uncle Vic

> Revised thesis submission - Sol's Dad

Pandemic Year 2021

Q1

> IRRODL Paper reject - Kat's Manny

> Springer Book Proposal Grant - Cousin Monina

> Teaching Presence in K-12 BL - Sir Lex Librero

FED Continuing Education Concept Paper + 3 Short Course Proposals -  Anj's Dad

Q2

So who is next? 

> Paper for ETS - Intersections of the CoI

> Paper for JOLR/AJODL - BL Philippines

Q3-Q4

> Developing an SR Instrument to Measure EB of LSTs and LAs -

> PhD by Independent Study Proposal

For every death comes the birth of some kind of writing which I don't even know what all these will amount to. I'll hold on to the USQ RWL as comrades-in-writing to help me through. Perhaps it'll be a hopeful way I can see this through. 

And with prayers, I'd really just have to beg from God-- please, not MY Victor, Manolo, Julieta nor Benjamin yet. That'll be heartbreaking...I'm not quite ready to say goodbye yet. Imagine what that can do to a 17-year old man-a-be, boy interrupted.